Fifteen newspapers in Denmark, including five major dailies, reprinted a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad which led to Muslim outrage and violence around the world two years ago. A daily newspaper in Sweden also reprinted it. The cartoon was reprinted to protest an alleged murder plot that was recently uncovered against Kurt Westergaard, the Danish cartoonist who drew it. A Danish citizen of Moroccan descent and two Tunisians were arrested. The Tunisians will face deportation and the other man has been released and will face preliminary charges. The newspapers have shown great courage in reprinting the cartoon because doing so places them in real danger. Hopefully the Danish justice system will react in kind by actually deporting the Tunisians and prosecuting the other accused to the full extent of the law.

In the meantime, a Somali man is currently on trial in Denmark for attempting to murder Westergaard. He is linked to the notorious Somali Islamist movement Al-Shebab and is also charged with attempted terrorism, attacking a police officer and illegal arms possession, all this as a result of breaking down Westergaard’s front door with an ax, entering his house, screaming that he was going to kill him because he had offended Muhammad and injuring a policeman who responded to the attack. The Somali says he is “a Muslim who follows the precepts of Islam and who prays and goes to the mosque.” There is no doubt that he will be found guilty as there is an overwhelming preponderance of evidence against him.

The real test will come in sentencing. Mohamed Geele, the defendant, faces life in prison when convicted on all the charges. If he is sentenced to anything less it will be a tangible sign that the Danish justice system doesn’t take his actions seriously, that it in fact excuses them and sees Islam as a mitigating factor. On the other hand, if he is sentenced in the harshest possible manner it will be a tangible sign that the justice system takes actions such as his very seriously indeed and that Islam is not seen as a mitigating factor at all. A light sentence would provide no deterrence whatsoever whereas a heavy one might, Islam notwithstanding.

Denmark’s justice system is facing another serious test as well.

Lars Hedegaard, a well respected Danish historian and journalist who is President of the International Free Press Society is being tried for bringing attention to the extensive and disproportionate number of family rapes in areas dominated by Muslims and Islamic culture, which are indisputable, well documented facts. This follows on the heels of a trial last December in which Member of Parliament Jesper Langballe was convicted for hate speech and racial discrimination for calling attention to honor killings in Muslim communities.

Both trials are an abomination and an affront to proponents of free speech and freedom of expression in Denmark and everywhere else too. They have one purpose only, to prevent the discussion of Islam in the public sphere (especially if that discussion is negative in any way) and are an assault on one of our most basic freedoms, the freedom to express ourselves about anything we want to in any way we see fit. They are part of the Islamization of Denmark, Europe and the West and the systematic erosion of the fundamental principles Western societies are built on. The justice system failed miserably in Langballe’s case. It has a chance to redeem itself in Hedegaard’s.

The outrage and violence that came about because of the original publication of the cartoons two years ago and the threats and intimidation that went along with this disgraceful, barbaric and unwarranted behavior were all part of an effort to stifle and eliminate free speech and freedom of expression in the West that continues to the present day, the events in Denmark being excellent examples. Islamization is a serious and growing threat to Western civilization everywhere and Western values and institutions are under attack by Islam and Islamists throughout the free world, including the United States and Canada. Every time we refuse to be intimidated and exercise our right to express ourselves freely by criticizing Islam, caricaturing Muhammad or doing anything else that Islamists find “offensive” and every time we hold perpetrators of violence legally responsible and refuse to accept Islam as an excuse or mitigating factor we take one more step on the road to survival. Every time we let Islam and the threat of harm control our reaction to events we hasten our demise.

The newspapers in Denmark and Sweden should be commended. Let’s also hope that the Danish justice system throws the book at Geele and the three other Islamists, overturns Langballe’s conviction and tosses the charges against Hedegaard into the garbage where they belong.

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on Thursday, January 20th, 2011 at 7:17 pm and is filed under Uncategorized.
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